by Harper Lin
“And he loved us so much,” Alberto went on.
Adriana nodded. Isabel shifted in her chair and kept staring at the wall.
“He came to all my games. All of them. He never missed a single one,” Alberto said.
Isabel glanced over at the kids then looked back at the wall. I actually looked over at it to see if there was something in particular she was looking at—maybe a picture of Pablo?—but there was nothing.
“He was my biggest fan.”
There was that look from Isabel again.
“Mine too,” Adriana said.
“Both of ours.” Alberto nodded. “It was like his whole world revolved around us.”
Adriana wiped at the tears that were spilling down her cheeks. “He came to all my dance recitals and shows and all my concerts. He told me all the time how proud of me he was. He would sit right in the front row, and he always had the biggest bouquet of flowers. My friends teased me about it, but I loved it.” She took a deep, shaky breath. “I saved all of them.”
Isabel stood up. “Miss Amaro brought us food. We should have some.” She turned on her heel and headed for the kitchen.
“I’ll help,” I said and followed after her.
Chapter Fourteen
Isabel seemed surprised when she saw me follow her through the door into the kitchen.
“I thought maybe you could use a hand,” I said cheerfully, moving over to where she was standing, ready to help her however I could.
“Thank you,” she said. “But I do not need help. I can get the food. You, go. Sit. Talk to the children. They seem to like you.” Her lips tightened into a firm set, and she turned away from me.
“I like them too. They seem like good kids. But, really, I’d like to help you.”
She looked at me suspiciously then wordlessly handed me a stack of plates. She reached up above her head to grab a platter, but it was just beyond the tips of her fingers.
I set the plates down on the counter. “Here, let me.” At five feet six inches, I wasn’t impressively tall, but I had a couple of inches on Isabel, and I thought it would be just enough to reach the platter.
She gave me the side-eye again but stepped aside. I reached up and was just able to grasp the platter and pull it down. I handed it to Isabel.
She nodded curtly and took it to the table where the bags I’d brought were sitting. “Thank you for bringing the food. It is very kind of you.”
I smiled. “I wanted to do something nice for you. To help you in some small way. To let you know that people care.”
She nodded without looking at me as she started taking the treats I’d brought out of the bag and arranging them on the platter. I moved over next to her and reached into the large bag. I pulled out a smaller bag that I’d stuffed full of cookies and started arranging them on the opposite side of the platter from where Isabel was setting out the muffins. She glanced up at me with her lips pressed together into what I took for a smile.
We worked in silence for a minute or two before I found the courage to ask her about the strained look that had been on her face in the living room.
“How are you doing, Isabel? You seemed kind of tense out there.” Even to my ears, it sounded fake, forced, and kind of creepy.
“It is an emotional time for all of us,” she said in a tone that completely lacked emotion.
I nodded, keeping my eyes on my hands and the pastries I was laying out. “I can imagine. It sounds like the kids were very close to Pablo.”
She nodded.
“Did they live here with you full-time, or did they spend time at their dad’s too?” I was reaching desperately for anything that could get her talking, even if it was oddly personal for someone she’d just met and if I already knew from Pablo that Alberto lived with him while Adriana lived with her mom.
“They live with me. Pablo’s apartment was too small to have children stay there.”
I tried to hide my surprise at her response. “I thought I remembered Pablo saying that Alberto was living with him.”
If she thought it was strange that I admitted I already knew the answer to the question I’d just asked her—even if it was a different answer from the one she gave—she didn’t indicate it. “Alberto stays there, but he has to sleep on the couch. There is no room for another bed. And I don’t like him to stay there alone when Pablo works late, so he only stays there when Pablo is not working.” She hesitated, almost like she felt bad for contradicting Pablo. “But Alberto keeps clothes there. He wants to spend more time with his dad.”
I nodded. That made sense. Sort of. “Either way, it’s great that he was able to be so involved in their lives, with their activities and all.”
Isabel barely reacted, just pressed her lips together and nodded almost imperceptibly.
“And that you and he were able to get along. For the sake of the kids, I mean.”
She gave even less of a reaction to that.
I decided to go in a different direction. “Sudden deaths are so hard. One minute they’re here and happy and healthy, and the next, they’re just gone. In the blink of an eye.” I sighed and shot a look at her out of the corner of my eye. “At least it seems that way. Sometimes though, you look back, and things that didn’t seem important before suddenly do. I was in New York when my mother died, but I sometimes wonder, if I’d been around, if I would have recognized any signs that her heart was going to give out. Was there anything like that that you noticed with Pablo?”
I didn’t know what kind of answer I was hoping for—it seemed unlikely that she was suddenly going to remember that someone had threatened to kill him and make it look like a stroke—but her terse “no” definitely wasn’t it. I had to try again.
The platter was getting full, and I knew that if I didn’t get her talking soon, I was going to lose my best chance at finding out what she knew. “So, everything was just normal then?”
She looked at me out of the corner of her eye. “Yes.”
I reached into the bag and pulled out the last thing in it—a small box of mini cupcakes. It was now or never. She’d probably throw me out if I kept pushing, but I didn’t know what else to do. “Huh. Some of his coworkers at the restaurant mentioned that he’d seemed a little on edge. You didn’t notice that?”
Her jaw clenched. “No.”
“I guess the circumstances you saw him in were different though, since he was there to see the kids.”
Her nostrils flared.
“It must be hard seeing them so upset.”
“It was hard seeing them upset when their father wasn’t there for them when they needed him.”
I froze, my hand hovering in place over the tray, still holding one of the mini cupcakes, and stared at her. She was still fiddling with some ladyfingers, arranging them artfully among the other pastries like the tray wasn’t just for an informal snack time and she hadn’t just said something fairly shocking about her recently deceased ex-husband.
“Isabel—”
She looked up calmly.
“But I thought Pablo—”
She set her jaw firmly.
“The kids said—”
She raised her eyebrows.
I finally set the mini cupcake down on the tray. “I’m confused.”
Isabel sighed and pursed her lips. “The kids, they remember the good times. All the good things Pablo did. They don’t know the other things, the not-so-good things.”
“Like what?” My voice came out as barely more than a whisper. I wanted to know, but I was afraid to find out.
Isabel looked down at the table, her fingertips resting on its edge. She took a deep, uneven breath, and when she looked back up at me, she looked very tired.
“He was a good dad. A very good dad. But then something happened. He stopped paying the child support. He stopped coming to take them out. I told them he was working extra time at the restaurant, but I do not think that is what he was doing. I told them he wanted to make more money for them, but there was no mo
re money. For a few months, there is no money at all. But I do not tell the kids that. I tell the kids nothing at all but that Dad is working. Sometimes I tell them his blood pressure is acting up. He had very high blood pressure. He take medicine, but sometimes the medicine doesn’t work, and he gets bad headache and stays in bed. I tell them that sometimes, too, but not too much. If I say that too much, they will worry, so I only say that if he cancels at the last minute. I want them to love their dad. I do not want them to think he was not taking care of them.” She took another deep breath and, as she exhaled, looked like she deflated. “I am sad because I know it is my fault that he did not come for them.”
“Why? How is that your fault?”
“Because of the money. He knew that if he came to the house to get the kids, I would ask him about the money. And he didn’t have an answer, so he didn’t come. He stayed away because of me, and now my kids don’t have the money or their dad.” She covered her face and sobbed into her hands.
I stood on the other side of the table, staring, not sure what to do. It was a private moment, and I was a stranger. I didn’t belong there. But I couldn’t leave her there to cry, especially when I knew she blamed herself for something that wasn’t even her fault.
I walked over and put my hand on her shoulder. She immediately turned, wrapped her arms around me, and buried her face in my shoulder. Awkwardly, I put my arms around her and patted her on the back while she cried. I didn’t know what else to do. I didn’t know what to say to help her feel better. All I knew to do was to let her cry. Which she did. For what seemed like an awfully long time, but that may have just been because I felt so awkward.
Finally, her sobs faded to sniffles, and she let go of me. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry,” she said, shaking her head and staring at the floor.
I patted her arm. “Don’t worry about it. I cried on plenty of shoulders after my mom died.” I grabbed a napkin from the table and handed it to her.
“Thank you,” she sniffled, dabbing at her eyes. “I’m sorry. I’m not being a good hostess.”
“Please, don’t worry about it. You have enough going on right now. You don’t need to worry about being a good hostess to a stranger who just dropped by to bring you food.”
“You are not a stranger, Fran. I do not know you long, but I know you are a good person. You are a friend to our family.”
I smiled. “Thank you. You’re very kind.” Again I had a wave of guilt that I wasn’t in her home under the most innocent of pretexts, but then I reminded myself that I was there to help her and her family. And I still didn’t have the information I needed to do that.
“No, Fran. You are the one who is very kind. You come here, you bring us food, and you comfort us. That is kindness.”
I felt worse. But I still had to find out about Pablo. “Thank you,” I said again then took a deep breath. It was now or never. “Isabel, I’m wondering—what happened so everything changed with Pablo?”
For a second, I thought she was going to refuse to answer. She shook her head. “I do not know. All I know is, a few months ago, everything changes. I asked, but no answer. He say he will pay, but he doesn’t. He say that a few times, then he stop coming.” She shook her head regretfully. “But one thing makes me very happy. On Thursday night, he come to see the kids. He want to take them out. It’s a school night, but it is so long since he come, I tell the kids, go! Have fun with your dad! And they did. They come home happy and smiling. They eat with their dad. They play on the beach. They have lots of fun. They say they have the best time ever. They go to bed happy, and they wake up happy. But that night… now they will not be happy for a long time.” Her eyes welled up with tears.
I took her hand and squeezed it. “But you know what?”
She looked up at me, her eyes searching for some sign of hope.
“They’ll have that night to remember for the rest of their lives. They’ll probably forget all about the times he didn’t take them out in the months before he died, but they’ll always remember that last night and how much fun they had.”
Isabel nodded. “You are right. They will.” She smiled. It wasn’t the most dazzling smile, but it was a smile all the same, and that’s what mattered.
“Should we get this food out to them?”
“Yes. They probably wonder where we are.” She glanced down at the table. “Just a couple more cookies to fit.”
I looked at the towering platter and wondered how we were going to fit more cookies on it without the entire thing toppling to the floor. And with the number of tasty baked goods already on it—cookies included—I didn’t think they would notice that one more small bag was missing. But Isabel was already working on getting them on there.
She pulled out a snickerdoodle and stared at it for a moment. Not sure if she knew what kind it was, I was about to tell her when she smiled at me, her eyes full of tears again. “Cinnamon sugar, no?”
I nodded. The snickerdoodle dough was formed into a ball and then rolled in cinnamon sugar before it baked. If you got enough on there—and I did, having practiced my technique over many years spent baking in the café—it formed a delicious crust on the cookie.
“Cinnamon sugar was Pablo’s favorite. He put it on everything he could. Toast, ice cream, hot chocolate. Always the cinnamon sugar. His favorite.”
I smiled, glad we were putting the last of the cookies on after all.
Once they were arranged and I saw Isabel eyeing the platter for how to carry it out to the living room, I remembered the rest of what I brought. “Oh! The coffee.”
Isabel looked away from the platter.
“I brought coffee. Here, this box is already brewed.” I nudged the box across the table toward her then reached into the other bag, pulling out the grounds I’d packaged up earlier. “And these are fresh-ground beans. I ground them right before I came over. And Sammy just roasted them this morning, so they’re fresh all around.”
Isabel took the bag from me and smiled. “Pablo loved the coffee from your café. He loved the mocha. Always the mocha. If you give him plain coffee, he would take a packet of hot chocolate and pour it in.”
“He had a little bit of a sweet tooth, huh?”
“A very big sweet tooth!” She laughed, and I couldn’t help but join in. After how sad she’d been just moments earlier, it felt good to see her laugh. “We can come back for the coffee to drink with our snack. Adriana doesn’t drink it, but Alberto does. He can probably drink the whole box himself!” She laughed again and hoisted the platter up onto her arm. I was shocked that the mountain of pastries didn’t come crashing down.
“Do you need help with that?” I swooped in next to her, hovering my hands below her arm as if I were spotting the snacks. And as if I could do anything more than save a cookie or two if they did come crashing down.
“No, no. I worked as a waitress for a long time. This is easy to me.”
“At least let me get the door for you!” I hurried toward the door, but before I could reach it, the back door opened, and Pablo walked in.
Chapter Fifteen
My heart stopped. I couldn’t breathe. There was Pablo, standing in his ex-wife’s kitchen, looking like he belonged there. I stared. I’d seen him fall. Seen him carried away. I’d been there when the call came in saying that he hadn’t made it. And now he was standing in front of me again.
“Eduardo!” Isabel put the platter of pastries down without so much as making one wobble and moved across the kitchen to give the man a hug.
“Eduardo?” I repeated hoarsely. My heart was pounding so fast I thought I might need to sit down. So I pulled a chair out from the table and parked myself in it before my legs gave out and I fell to the floor.
Isabel was hugging the man. They kissed each other on their cheeks. Still, I couldn’t breathe. Why—how—was Pablo standing in Isabel’s kitchen, and why was she acting like it was nothing more than a pleasant surprise? And why was she calling him Eduardo? With the adrenaline pum
ping through my veins, I could only think of the million questions I now had, and not a single answer.
“Fran, this is my brother-in-law, Eduardo. Eduardo, this is Fran, from the coffee shop downtown. She came to bring us some food and some coffee and to give her sympathy.” Isabel’s hand rested on his shoulder while his was on her lower back.
“Your brother-in-law?”
Realization dawned across the face of the man she kept calling Eduardo. “She thinks I’m Pablo!”
Isabel looked from him to me and back again. “You think… oh, yes! I see that now.” She smiled at me. “Eduardo is Pablo’s brother. I know them so long, I forget they look alike!”
I looked at Eduardo more closely now. He had the same full mustache as Pablo, and his eyes crinkled the same way at the corners. He had the same thick glossy-black hair—the kind of glossiness I could only dream about—but the hairline was farther back and marred by a scar cutting across his forehead above his eyebrow and over to his temple. He was thinner, too, lacking Pablo’s bowl-full-of-jelly midsection. The more I looked, the more little differences I saw, but the resemblance was still striking and still had me feeling a little off balance.
“She looks like she’s seen a ghost!” Eduardo said. “And I think she feels like she has.”
“I kind of do.” I managed to pull myself together enough to get to my feet. “Sorry about that. It’s a pleasure to meet you.” I stuck my hand out and shook his. His other one was still on Isabel’s back though, I noticed.
“A pleasure to meet you too, Fran. I come to your café many times. Thank you for your kindness to my sister-in-law.” He smiled down at her, and she back up at him.
“Oh, it’s nothing. It’s the least I can do to help someone out.” It really did feel like the least I could do, since all I’d done was gather up some stuff that was sitting around the café, but I was glad they appreciated it. “You spoke at Pablo’s funeral, didn’t you?” I asked, digging up the memory of him leading the family down the aisle at the church and then giving one of the eulogies.